The invention pertains to an automatic loader for an armored vehicle.
Such automatic loaders are for example disclosed in German published application No. 30 17 323 and in U.S. Pat. No. 4,391,179. In this known automatic loader for a large caliber weapon a rammer or device for driving a projectile into the breech of the gun barrel is required which projectiles are moved into a sliding-in position in the turret of the vehicle. These projectiles are arranged in a turret-fixed magazine in a vertical stack and must then be turned one after the other and transported by a plural transporting arrangement towards the gun barrel. The projectiles are first, after leaving the magazine transported in a vertical direction, then rotated in a rotating arrangement and before they are placed on a lifting arrangement for vertical transporting and then must be laterally slid in a sliding arrangement. Such automatic loaders require for the various transport arrangements a high mechanical and constructional input which causes the drawback of frequent malfunctioning and requires a large space. Such transport arrangements are heavy which negatively influences the armor for the vehicle, respectively the weight of the armored vehicle, and require for the travel of the projectile via the numerous transport stations an inordinately large transportation time.